Through loyalty to the past, our mind refuses to realize that tomorrow’s joy is possible only if today’s makes way for it; that each wave owes the beauty of its line only to the withdrawal of the preceding one.

To read a writer is for me not merely to get an idea of what he says, but to go off with him, and travel in his company.

The belief that becomes truth for me ... is that which allows me the best use of my strength, the best means of putting my virtues into action.

Through fear of resembling one another, through horror at having to submit, through uncertainty as well, through skepticism and complexity, there is a multitude of individual little beliefs for the triumph of strange little individuals.

Life never presents us with anything which may not be looked upon as a fresh starting point, no less than as a termination.

The work of art is the exaggeration of an idea.

The work of art is a part of nature seen through a temperament.

The artist cannot get along without a public; and when the public is absent, what does he do? He invents it, and turning his back on his age, he looks toward the future for what the present denies.

Pay attention only to the form; emotion will come spontaneously to inhabit it. A perfect dwelling always finds an inhabitant.

Great authors are admirable in this respect: in every generation they make for disagreement. Through them we become aware of our differences.